Cat Ears
by carpfish
Summary: It all began with a pair of Cat Ears. Modern AU. For UniqueYetSimple's writer's contest.


Title: Cat Ears

Chapter: 1 - And So He Crumbles Before the Woman He Loves

Author: Rayshia

Fandom: Heart no Kuni no Alice

Genre: Humor/Parody

Rating: T

Pairings/Characters: Boris Airay, Alice Liddel, Blood Dupre, Tweedle Dum, Tweedle Dee, Elliot March, Ace; Alice x Boris, Boris x Various

Summary: By the end of the day, Boris was certain that Blood was gay, Elliot had an identity crisis, Peter was more trigger happy than a hundred drunk marine corps, Vivaldi had an unhealthy obsessession with cute things, Grey was a molester, and Alice was evil for having caused all this.

Suggested Soundtrack: Magical Nuko Len Len by VOCALOID, 玩偶 by 王力厷

Warning(s): Moeisation, severe OOC, slaughter of character, crack, pathetic attempt at humor, modern AU

Written for UniqueYetSimple's contest

* * *

"Please, Boris?"

Boris Airay flinched as he met his light-haired female friend's pleading gaze. No-one in the world could stand against the puppy dog pout of Alice Liddel. Raising a hand to shield his eyes from the sight, the purple-haired boy shook his head vigorously as he grimaced at her proposal. "No, Alice," he stated firmly, still not daring to look her in the eye. "You know that there's many things I'd be willing to do for you, but this is definitely not one of them. I honestly didn't think you'd tease me like this!" he whined. "I mean, I know purple's not the most masculine color on the planet, and that normally only girls wear mid-riff shirts, and the way I always chase Pierce around raises some questions, but I'm hurt that you would think that I'm-"

Placing her hands on her hips and stamping one foot indignantly, Alice didn't let him finish. "No! I wasn't insinuating that! But still..." Her annoyed expression melted into a pleading one, and she stared up at her friend, eyes sparkling and letting loose all the cuteness she could muster.

"Please, Boris... Just this one little favor..."

Said teenaged boy's eyes widened as he tried to look away in time once he realized what she was about to do, but was too slow. One glance and he was caught in her trap. Eyes... So... Shiny... The purplette thought as he squinted in the sparkliness of the exchange student's gaze. Talk about firing the kawaii cannons on full blast. However, furtively attempting to strengthen his weakening resolve and retain some of his pride, Boris shook his head once again. "No, Alice..."

"I'll love you forever..."

The amber-eyed boy couldn't believe that the foreigner would use such underhanded tactics, even taking advantage of the knowledge that he had a crush on her, to achieve her own goals. And the worst part was that it worked. As soon as Alice had uttered that short sentence, any remaining resistance he had at all melted into a slushy, smoothie-like substance. His weakness for that girl was going to be the death of him some day. Shoulders slumping and head hanging in resignation, Boris sighed, "Okay... I'll do it..."

Pumping the air with her fist in victory, Alice smiled brightly. "That's great, Boris! I've already got the costume ready! It's in my room right now! Let's go!" she exclaimed ecstaticly, and grabbed her friend's gloved hand, dragging him along with her towards her dorm room. Boris did his best not to blush as she pulled him along, but failed as his yellow, catlike eyes constantly flickered from ahead to wear their hands were connected. Technically, they were holding hands. Oh mackarel, he thought, get a grip on yourself! Stop acting like an immature little kid! It's just holding hands... It's not like it means anything...

Before he knew it, Boris Airay was inside Alice Liddel's dorm, sitting on her bed as she searched through her closet for the earlier mentioned costume. Soon, reappearing from the depths of her wardrobe, the foreigner smiled sweetly as Boris eyed the costume in her hands in terror. "You've. Got. To. Be. Kidding me." the purple haired boy stated flatly.

Alice shrugged as she brought the clothes hanger with the costume over towards the bed. "Hey, I did say that it was a cosplaying photoshoot. And that you were going to be the Magical Girl main character," she rebutted, setting it down.

"B-but, you never told me it would be this bad!" the poor victim of her manipulation stuttered as his face contorted into an expression of pure dread.

Pursing her lips and placing her hands on her hips, the blonde girl rolled her eyes. "I did say Magical Girl. What did you expect?" she asked, but before Boris could respond, she turned around on her her heel and began to march towards the door. "Now, I'm going to leave the room and when I come back in five minutes later, you are going to be wearing that costume, okay?" Her tone left no room for disagreement, and as she got closer to the door, any hope Boris had for salvation was shrivelling up into a black skeletal husk.

In a last ditch effort to maybe change her mind and save his dignity, the cat-eyed boy wailed, "Cat ears? Seriously?" But his desperate cry was only answered by the sound of a door slamming and being locked from the outside.

* * *

When Alice Lidell returned to her room, a glorious sight beheld her. Her purplette friend stood up when she entered, and now she couldn't take her eyes off him. He was the most adorable thing she had ever seen, and it took all of her self-restraint to not tackle him on the spot.

Boris Airay was wearing a purple cheerleader-type tank top and miniskrt- yes, miniskirt- lavishly decorated with ribbons and lace. The largest ribbon, a yellow one tied in thecenter top of his shirt, was complimented by a matching one serving as a belt sewed to the top of his skirt, paralell to the black lace on the hem. Peeking out from the skirt was what appeared to be a cat tail the exact shade of purple as his hair, and sat atop his head was a matching pair of cat ears. He had not yet forsaken his purple and black striped socks and fingerless gloves, but they only added to the cuteness factor.

Pouting childishly, Boris blushed under Alice's adoring stare and pulled on one of the cat ears. "H-hey... Stop staring at me like that..." he murmured, averting his gaze.

"Boris, it looks perfect! Better than I ever imagined!" Alice gushed.

The cat couldn't help but mutter, "Yeah... Strangely I can't help but wonder how you got my clothing measurements..."

Ignoring her friend's enquiry, the girl turned around to fetch her camera. "This is great! Blood and the others should be here any moment now," she commented to nobody in particular. Upon hearing her statement, Boris couldn't help but do a double take, golden eyes widening in surprise.

"B-blood? As in Blood Dupre?" he questioned, not daring to believe what he was hearing. The Hatter house captain could be wrapped up in this as well. The man was so strict, so deceptive, so serious. The thought of him doing something like cosplaying was simply... Unimaginable.

Before Alice could even respond, there was a knock on the door, and a dark-haired man with a top hat entered the room, inviting himself in. "So, we're ready?" he asked charmingly as he leaned up against a wall using one arm, sizing up the boy in the skirt in front of him. Boris frowned at being scrutinized like this, and by a guy no less. I mean, sure, he had never liked being ignored, and the attention of others was always welcome (especially if said others included Alice), and on the street, even his normal way of dressing was enough to draw a few stares, but this was just embarassing. He felt ridiculous, and he could practically see the corner of Dupre's mouth twitching as he tried to hold back either a smirk or laughter. Pouting while pulling down the miniskirt (This thing was way too short. How did girls deal with these? It was so... Drafty!) At about this point, the cat noticed that Blood wasn't the only one staring.

"You know, Boris, I'm kind of jealous," Alice commented as her eyes scanned him up and down. The purplette could feel his body temperature rising under her gaze. "I think... You probably look cuter in that outfit than I ever could. And you're a guy!"

Looking to Blood, she tilted her head slightly to one side and frowned. "Where's the camera?" she asked. The hat-wearing house captain smoothly responded that it was with Elliot, who was waiting outside. Snapping his fingers, a pair of dark-haired twin boys, one in a red t-shirt, one in blue, dashed into the room.

"Whaddaya want, Boss?" The one with the red shirt, and strangely, red eyes as well, chirped as the two clumsily saluted. The blue-eyed one noticed Boris out of the corner of his eye, and immediately burst into laughter.

"Boris, what are you wearing?"

Blushing in embarrassment, said cat boy fidgeted with some of the ribbons. "Shut up!" he yelled, not wishing to be ridiculed by the twins.

Alice tilted her head slightly to the side. "Hm? Blood, you brought your cousins?"

The house captain pretended not to hear Boris' muttered comment of, "Cousins? More like evil henchmen," as he smiled calmly.

"They'll be helping out Elliot with the cameras and props," he explained, shrugging as he glanced towards the two children, who were by now in hysterics over their purple-haired friend's getup.

"Dee, Dum, Alice and I will get changed into our costumes. Take Boris to the photoshoot, we'll be there in a second," the house captain instructed. Stifling their laughs, the twins followed their supposed boss' order's, each grabbing one of the helpless boy's arms and dragging him out of the dormroom before he could even make a protest.

"Wa-waaait!"

* * *

"What are you doing here, idiot?"

"Hm? Oh, hi Elliot. Didn't expect to see you here, I was heading for the gym. I have kendo practice today."

"The gym is on the other side of the campus, genius!"

"Really? Haha, guess I must've gotten lost again!"

This was the scene that beheld Boris when the twins dragged him into the small park on the Harte Academy campus. Elliot March, who was carrying what was probably his own weight's worth of cameras and equipment, somehow managed to do so while yelling insults at Ace Knight, who was scratching the back of his head sheepishly while laughing. The directionally challenged kendo star was carrying a gym bag on one of his shoulders and a wooden sword in his free hand, which effectively backed up his claim of being on his way to practice. On the other hand, Blood's 'best friend' seemed to be struggling with his load, and doing his best to not drop anything on the floor, lest he should face the unholy wrath of a certain livid blur-eyed girl.

Tutting as he rolled his eyes, Dee, who was gripping Boris' left hand, looked at his brother on the right. "Should we help the newbie, brother?"

"Well, if he breaks the cameras, Alice nee-san might get angry, and we won't be able to take pictures either..."

Coming to a decision, the twins strolled forward and began taking various cameras, boxes of props, and equipment off the redhead's hands.

"Oi, newbie, let us handle this!" Dum ordered, stomping on one of the older student's feet when he refused to let go of some of the items.

"Yeah, you're gonna drop everything and ruin it all!" Dee complained as he balanced a tripod, a camera, and two cardboard boxes.

Muttering a colorful variety of curse words under his breath, Elliot winced as the boy stepped on his foot, and tried to save some face. "Hey! I was perfectly fine! I didn't need you two lazy brats' help!" he objected, trying to hold on to some of his remaining loot as the younger boys attempted to steal it from him.

Even Boris had to roll his eyes at the blatant lie. The red-head was just taking them for either idiots, or blind people. Boris was just about to enter the conversation and let his presence be known, when he felt something tugging and playing with one of his fake cat ears. The purplette's shoulders stiffened, and he whipped his head around to see a certain brunette's smiling face.

"Wow, Mr. Kitty-cat! You look so pretty in that dress, like a cute little girl!" Ace commented, his tone deceptively gentle as he toyed around with the purple ear. Boris' gaze hardened to a mistrusting glare as he jerked his head away from the athelete. There was something about Ace that Boris really didn't like. Whether it was the way he was unnervingly perverted at times when around Alice, or because on the school camping trip, some mixup occurred that caused Ace and Alice to have to share a tent, the now-catboy just really disliked him. After all, the tall student could possibly be trying to steal Alice away from him!

However, the amber-eyed student was jerked from his train of thought when a feminine voice called out, "Hey! What're you guys doing messing around? We don't have all day, lets get this photoshoot set up!"

The instant the cat-eared boy looked towards the source of the order, he swore to himself that never in his life was he going to allow himself to be dragged into one of Alice's cosplay schemes again.

Because while Alice's White Mage costume looked perfectly gorgeous on her, the sight of Blood Dupre in a colorful, tight, almost spandex-like superhero-esque bodysuit, sporting a cheesy cape and eyemask, was surely an image that would be burned into poor Boris' brain forever, and induce horrific nightmares for at least a month.

* * *

A/N: Thus concludes the first chapter of "Cat Ears". I apologize for my terrible attempt at humor. Sadly, this genre is not my forte and I am using you all as guinea pigs to test out my writing. I hope that I did not bore you too much. I think I accidently wrote Ace and Elliot too much like Yamamoto and Gokudera from KHR... I also apologize for that rather terrifying mental image in that last sentence.

EDIT:

Fixed line breaks and a few typoes. For the record, the "Blood is Gay" thing is a reference to FatePwnsYou's amazing stories. She's a wonderful writer. If you haven't read "Childhood Wonder", then you do not know what you are missing.

Thank you for reading this, I greatly appreciate it!

~R


End file.
